


Love on a Silver Spoon

by atreacherousoldwitch



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Black Family-centric (Harry Potter), But not explicit, Canon Compliant, Cousin Relationship, Dysfunctional Family, F/M, Injury, Lucretia is ride or die, Minor Character Death, Societal expectations, The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, Wizarding Aristocracy, but happy ending, but they care somewhat, canon pairings - Freeform, for Walburga anyway, ie the Black family are not good people, no one in this fic is a particularly good person, romance - ish, sort of low key abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-09
Updated: 2020-12-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:27:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27981501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atreacherousoldwitch/pseuds/atreacherousoldwitch
Summary: ‘You could marry me,’ Orion says again.Walburga considers her little cousin for a moment.‘I’m a fair bit older than you are,’ she says, and it’s true. The gulf between them feels like a lifetime, Orion fourteen, Walburga eighteen.‘I’ll wait. If you do.’Love has no place in marriage. Marriage is for political or social advancement, lust, power, or to hide unintended pregnancies.Walburga knows this. Yet it takes five engagements before she eventually makes it down the aisle.
Relationships: Orion Black/Walburga Black
Comments: 4
Kudos: 31





	Love on a Silver Spoon

**Author's Note:**

> A/N - Soooo Walburga Black huh? This was kind of inspired by my other fic ‘the knife my mother held’, where we looked at some of the - not necessarily darker - but maybe more complicated characters in the HP. In ‘the knife’ Walburga is kind of the villain, and she’s that in canon too. I wanted to explore a bit about how she got to that point. 
> 
> Also! The Black family tree is wild. It wasn’t until I looked closer that I realised Walburga is canonically 4 years older than Orion. 4 years isn’t a lot when you’re adults, but when you’re young, 4 years is a loooooong time. So I wanted to explore that a bit as well. 
> 
> Note - there’s no underage here, nothing happens between Walburga and Orion when they’re young, or Orion’s underage. They do have a conversation about marriage when Orion is young, but that’s all it is - a conversation. There’s references to alcohol, and a bit of bad language, and some violence/hints at assault but not graphic or explicit. 
> 
> Poem at the beginning is by Lauren Eden.

_When you are_

_not fed love on_

_a silver spoon_

_you learn to lick it_

_off knives_

————

One. 

———— 

‘After all,’ Walburga says with a flourish, waving her cigarette in Lucretia’s face. ‘Who’s going to want to marry me?’

Lucretia snorts into her wine, and they stand for a moment sniggering, until Lucretia’s mother calls out the patio door for them. Lucretia shakes her head, and puts the cigarette out on the marble balcony.

‘Someone will Burgie,’ she says fondly, ignoring the slap Walburga sends her way at the use of the hated nickname.

‘No one handsome,’ Walburga laments, and Lucretia is still laughing when she follows her mother’s voice and heads back inside the hall.

Walburga lingers for a moment.

Of course she’s wrong. She’s her parents’ only daughter. She and Lucretia are the only girls of their generational line. She’s a Black. Someone will want to marry her, and they’ll be pureblood and rich.

But she won’t have a choice in it.

It’ll be an arranged marriage, one deemed acceptable by her family. They’ll pick well for her, of course, but that’s not the point. She’ll be tied - shackled - to some man, who’ll expect from her all the things a man expects from his wife. With no power of her own.

Without even her name.

 _Awful_ , she thinks.

She takes a drag of her cigarette, and puts it out by Lucretia’s.

When she turns, stood in the doorway is Orion.

He doesn’t say anything, and he doesn’t look awkward or apologetic for being caught loitering. He’s grown since the last time she saw him at the beginning of the summer. Lanky, in that way all teenage boys are when their limbs stretch and the rest of them is trying to catch up. They’re almost of a height now, and with his dark eyes and regal features, _Black features,_ Walburga thinks, there’s no doubt that her little cousin is going to be very handsome.

‘How are you Orion?’ she says, because if she doesn’t he won’t start a conversation.

‘Well. And yourself?’

‘Yes, quite well.’ And she turns to face him fully.

‘Your mother is looking for you.’

‘Ah, thank you.’

Walburga rises, and when she draws even with Orion, he makes an aborted gesture with his hand. She pauses, eyebrows raised.

‘You could marry me,’ he says, and if it wasn’t obvious that he’d been eavesdropping on them, it is now.

‘It’s not nice to listen to other people’s conversations,’ she chides.

‘You could marry me,’ he says again.

Walburga considers him for a moment.

‘I’m a fair bit older than you are,’ she says, and it’s true. Four years feels like a lifetime in this moment.

‘I’ll wait. If you do.’

 _He’s going to be the head of your family,_ the little voice in the back of her head whispers. _He’s heir apparent, and one day, he’ll be in charge._

It’s true. As Arcturus’ only son, Orion is, arguably, the most important member of their family.

 _Your children would be Blacks_ , that voice whispers again.

And he is awfully handsome.

She watches him, and he gazes evenly back. He doesn’t jump into things. Where Lucretia launches herself from one catastrophe to another in a way that’s almost Gryffindor, Orion is Slytherin through and through. Measured. Patient. Clever.

For him to voice this to her this evening isn’t an impulse. It isn’t a whim. He’s thought about this.

Walburga reaches out a hand, and strokes the back of her fingers down his cheek. Turns her hand over and cups his face.

But he is only fourteen. It’s a long time before anyone will start looking at him to get married.

‘If you still feel this way when you leave school,’ she says, almost gentle. ‘If you still want to then, yes I’ll marry you.’

‘Yes?’ Orion asks. He’s hesitant, as if he hadn’t expected her to say it.

She smiles.

‘Yes.’

And Walburga leans in and presses a kiss to his cheek.

She sweeps into the ballroom, and leaves him standing there in the shadows.

 _How interesting,_ she thinks, as Irma wraps an arm around her daughter’s waist and pulls her across the room to be introduced to someone.

How interesting.

————

Abraxus Malfoy is loud and obnoxious. He drinks a bottle of wine to himself over dinner, and he launches into long winded debate about this and that, and Walburga is ready to claw her eyes out.

Lucretia catches her eye, and purses her lips. She’s trying not to laugh.

Walburga takes a gulp of wine, and ignores her mother’s frown.

If her future husband is going to get drunk and talk about Quidditch like a pleb, then the least she can do is enjoy her wine to make this horrible evening bearable.

When, eventually, he does leave, he kisses her on the hand and his lips are so wet, that she has to seriously resist the urge to wipe it on her dress.

_Disgusting._

They fall into quiet.

A sort of stunned quiet.

‘Melin’s beard,’ Pollux exclaims quietly, and though his wife hits him on the arm it’s too late.

Lucretia snorts into her wine, nearly spilling it everywhere, and Cygnus is laughing too. Alphard tries to hide it, but Walburga can see his grin behind his handkerchief.

‘He can bloody talk,’ Lucretia says.

‘Far too much,’ Walburga agrees.

Irma sighs.

‘He’s - he’s the heir to his family you know,’ she says, but it’s clear her heart’s not in it.

‘Just think Maman,’ Alphard says, ‘every Christmas and Birthday for the rest of Burgie’s life.’

‘Don’t call me that,’ she hisses, but inwardly she’s despairing because _he’s right._

‘She’s only twenty,’ Pollux says slowly. ‘We can afford to be - picky.’

And he shares a look with his wife. It’s heavy, filled with unsaid things that Walburga doesn’t understand.

Eventually Irma turns back to the table, and nods her head.

‘I’m sorry darling,’ she says to Walburga, ‘I don’t think it’s a good fit.’

Relief like she has never known before rushes over her, and down her spine.

‘Whatever you think best Maman,’ she says demurely.

‘He’s been carrying on with that Avery girl anyway,’ Cygnus says.

‘Burgie would eat him alive,’ Alphard adds, and there are sniggers all around the table.

That settles it.

————

‘Thank merlin,’ Walburga whispers to Lucretia later that evening, when they’re both tucked up in her bed.

‘He was awful,’ she agrees. ‘Stupid hair, and ridiculous jacket. Handsome alright, but so - urgh.’

‘Urgh is right.’

‘We’ll find someone better,’ Lucretia says reassuringly, as if she has any influence over the decision at all.

Walburga settles closer to her cousin. They used to share a dorm at school. Sometimes they’d sneak into each others’ beds in the middle of the night, for any reason really.

Boredom or loneliness or gossip.

It’s nice, having Lucretia so close, she thinks as she settles her head against Lucretia’s shoulder.

‘Burgie, Burgie,’ Lucretia half sings half whispers, and then lets out a shrill shriek when Walburga slaps her on the stomach.

 _Maybe not,_ she thinks, as Lucretia retaliates and pulls her hair.

————

Two. 

———— 

Caius Rosier is slimy. His hair is long, dark, greased back slick against his head.

His hand is heavy against Walburga’s waist. A diamond ring glitters on her left hand. The engagement is a done deal, arranged and finalised. All that’s left is a wedding.

It’s Lucretia’s engagement party. At twenty two, they’re both prime age for engagement.

Ignatius Prewett is -

Well. He’s not Walburga’s cup of tea. She thinks him insipid, shy and timid.

But there’s something in the way he looks at Lucretia. A kind of wide eyed wonder. And Walburga knows her cousin better than most - better than anyone - and Lucretia isn’t as disinterested as she appears.

He’s -

Sweet.

Caius is not.

He’s more calculated than Malfoy, but he’s power hungry. He doesn’t care for her - not that she particularly cares - but there’s something in his eyes that say he wouldn’t hesitate if he thought he could advance himself.

And he smells awful. A spicy aftershave that clings to his hair and clothes. And his lips are too narrow, jaw weak and at twenty six he’s unable to grow a full beard.

Walburga is absolutely not going to marry him. She’s already decided this. It’s just a case of persuading every one else.

She catches sight of Orion on the other side of the room, Lucretia’s arm around him. The bride-to-be has passed from politely tipsy into fully drunk, and it looks like Orion is holding her up.

He’s eighteen now, almost a man. Tall. Handsome.

 _Unengaged_.

Not that it matters. There was never any follow up from their conversation nearly four years ago.

Not that Walburga cares.

Caius leans close, and Walburga resists the urge to flinch, as his breath hits her cheek.

He sidles away to the drinks table, and Walburga thinks. Hard.

When Lucretia comes flying over an hour later, exuberant and happy, she throws her arms around Walburga. It’s not difficult for Walburga to whisper in her cousin’s ear, a tricky little plan.

Lucretia laughs, and then says with a solemn expression ‘I do anything for you Burgie,’ and it’s so sincere that she lets the detested nickname slip past unchallenged.

————

Forty minutes later Ignatius has punched Caius in the face, and Lucretia is fake weeping loudly, hysterically, her face screwed up and cheeks pink. She’s drunkenly sobbing a tale of woe about how Caius had pressed himself against her in the bathroom.

If Caius looks mildly confunded, then that’s probably the alcohol and the punch to the head.

They leave with Lucretia’s marriage cemented, Ignatius with the begrudging respect of his in-laws, and both the champagne tower and Walburga’s engagement in pieces on the floor.

Lucretia has stopped crying, and she presses a kiss to Walburga’s cheek in good bye. Orion offers her his arm, to walk her to floo, and she takes it, patting him fondly on the cheek as she leaves.

————

If Irma screams until she’s blue in the face, and smacks Walburga until she’s seeing stars, then that’s nobody’s business.

Walburga carefully holds a cloth to her bleeding nose, and watches herself in the mirror.

 _Worth it,_ she thinks.

————

Three. 

————

Richard Douglas Flint is -

Polite, Walburga thinks, charitably. Plain. Boring.

‘Terrified of you,’ Lucretia mutters in her ear, and Walburga doesn’t laugh but Cygnus does on her other side.

Walburga leans over, and pinches the thin skin of her brother’s wrist between her nails. She squeezes, hard.

Cygnus flinches, and wretches his hand away.

‘Bitch,’ he whispers in her ear, and stalks away.

Lucretia links her arm through Walburga’s, and they watch as Richard is toured around the room, meeting various family members.

‘He’s fine,’ Lucretia mutters, and Walburga can’t even bring herself to answer that.

He is fine.

Walburga doesn’t want _fine._

She wants -

She doesn’t know what she wants, though her eyes flick across the room, to her cousin.

 _It wasn’t meant to be,_ she thinks.

————-

‘Congratulations,’ Orion drawls, from behind her. Walburga doesn’t flinch, she’s better than that, but she does glance up over her shoulder.

Orion raises his glass to her, ‘to your engagement.’

She can’t tell if he’s joking.

‘Thank you,’ she mutters back, and turns back to the window. Outside the trees sway in the winter gale, and the lands stretch out in front of them.

He draws level with her. She can feel his eyes on her, but she doesn’t know what he wants.

Or what he sees.

‘When’s the wedding?’

‘As soon as my mother can organise it,’ she says, ‘soon, I expect.’

Orion nods. They stand in silence.

‘Are you - looking forward to it?’

Walburga turns, and shakes off her melancholy mood. She leans over and swipes his drink - brandy - and claims it for herself, taking a large gulp.

Orion barely blinks.

She leans close to him, too close. Walburga looks threateningly in his face.

‘No,’ she whispers, challenging, ‘no I’m not looking forward to it.’

And she turns and leaves him standing there.

————-

The Christmas party is over, and Walburga is desperate to go home, but she has to wait for everyone to finish exchanging pleasantries.

_Merlin._

Lucretia has already gone, whisked away by Ignatius, both of them eying each other intently. Cygnus has disappeared as well, Druella demanding, claiming illness.

Walburga is the oldest female of the family still unmarried. Eyes watch her closely, judging.

 _Fuck you,_ Walburga thinks.

Orion comes over to say goodbye, and he presses a kiss to her cheek. 

He squeezes her hand, and there’s an unexpected moment, when they look at each other for a moment, something heavy between them.

Then Orion turns, and strides away. He strikes an imposing figure, and she watches until he leaves.

Walburga _wants._

————-

It’s not difficult, in the end.

Richard Flint is a second son, not set to inherit. He’s meek, and wants an easy life. He’s a poor match for Walburga. She wonders if her parents are becoming desperate.

A stark conversation between the two of them, unchaperoned, is all it takes.

Two days later, Walburga hands back the engagement ring, and her and Flint part ways.

She’s the only one happy about this.

Irma turns away from her in disgust. Pollux grabs Walburga by the throat, and pins her to the wall in their dining room.

‘You will get married,’ he hisses, spit flying from his mouth, his eyes bulging. ‘You will get married, or so help me God.’

Walburga escapes to her room with a bloody nose and a black eye.

————

She carefully applies her make up the next morning, the shadow of a bruise still lingering around her eye. When she meets Lucretia for lunch, Orion joins them, and though she doesn’t say anything, she can see him eyeing her bare left hand. 

————

Four. 

———— 

Roth Lestrange II is _wild._

Walburga thinks that if they could align themselves, then they might be a good match. But his hatred for her, his resentment at their engagement is clear to see, in all their interactions.

It’s novel, Walburga thinks, to not be the one who hates the engagement the most.

————

‘He’s in love with Amabel Rosier,’ Alphard informs her, over breakfast. ‘They dated in school, and he wanted to marry her, but he’s the oldest son so he needs to make better match.’

Alphard can always be relied on to have the most up to date gossip.

‘And that’s why he despises the engagement so much?’ Walburga asks idly, eyebrows raised.

‘That, and he knows for a fact that he can’t control you. Amabel is meek. You’re not.’

She thinks that might be the nicest thing her brother has ever said to her.

————

Walburga thinks that they might be able to work up a deal.

It doesn’t come down to that.

————-

Roth has come to Grimmauld place, for customary dinner with his future in-laws. It’s the fourth dinner of its kind that Walburga has attended, and she’s _tired._

She has disappeared upstairs for a moment, to reapply her lipstick between courses, and when she comes out the bathroom, Roth is there.

‘Can I help you?’ she says, unflustered.

Roth towers over her. He looms close, threatening.

Walburga is not threatened.

‘We will never get married,’ he hisses, and Walburga shrugs.

‘Fine with me. Excuse me,’ and she pushes past him, to head back down the stairs.

It happens very quickly.

He grabs her from behind, his hand around her wand arm, and he pulls her back off balance.

Walburga doesn’t cry out, but it’s close. She tries to reach for her wand, with her other hand, but suddenly his hand is around her throat.

For a moment, Walburga panics.

She falls down, toppling over and cracks her head on the side of the staircase. The world swims for a moment. Roth is a heavy weight on her, and Walburga pulls her sense from wherever they’d been hidden.

She pushes, hard, with her arms and her knee, and Roth is not expecting it. He topples over, and he leans to catch himself, but he’s at the top of the stair case, and suddenly he’s falling.

Walburga doesn’t look, but the sound his body makes as it tumbles down the stairs, and hits the ground is incredibly satisfying.

When she looks up, Orion is stood at the bottom of the stairs, and Roth is dead.

————

There’s chaos.

Irma shrieks. Someone calls the aurors and the healers. Orion helps her to her feet, and they examine her head.

‘What happened,’ Irma hisses, and she grips Walburga’s wrist until she bruises.

‘He attacked her,’ Orion says, his voice calm and cool. He cuts through the panic and stress. ‘He attacked her, and Walburga defended herself. He fell awkwardly. It was an accident.’

Walburga doesn’t dare voice the thought that they all have - that a fall down the stairs shouldn’t have been enough to kill a wizard - babies have fallen from further heights and bounced on impact.

She doesn’t dare speculate what Orion did, in the seconds before Walburga turned.

In the end, the case is closed simply. The bruises on Walburga’s neck speak for themselves, and so do the bruises on her wrists and the crack on her head.

Roth Lestrange II is buried in his family cemetery. His younger brother marries Amibel Rosier.

————

Irma goes to France for the summer. Pollux can’t look Walburga in the eye. Cygnus is preoccupied with his ever growing family. Alphard disappears one evening and doesn’t return until Christmas.

Walbuga is here. Well on her way to becoming a spinster.And the more husbands she chases away, the more her reputation grows.

Twenty eight is too old to be unmarried. There must be something wrong with her. Walburga is starting to think it herself.

————-

Five. 

———— 

Grimmauld place. The dining room. Irma and Pollux watch Walburga closely, intently.

In her hand is an envelope.

‘An engagement offer,’ Irma says slowly, and Walburga sighs inwardly. The fifth engagement offer she’s had.

But when she turns it over, her first clue to the family she’ll be expected to marry into this time, it’s -

She sees her own family crest staring back at her. She doesn’t look up.

Slowly, she peels away the wax, glancing at the signature at the bottom of the letter - it’s signed by Arcturus, the head of the family - and in it -

It’s an offer of engagement. To Orion. Walburga feels suddenly breathless.

It’s ten years, almost to the day, when they’d stood on the balcony of this very house, and he’d asked her to marry him. She knew that he could play the long game. He’d learnt it at his father’s knee. She just hadn’t known quite how _well_ he could play it.

How well he could manoeuvre in the background, to get exactly what he wanted.

‘Yes.’ She says, simply. And hands it back. ‘I accept.’

‘You’d better,’ Irma snaps. ‘You don’t have a choice. You’re marrying this boy and I’ll see you down the aisle if it’s the last thing I do.’

 _And that’s where you’re wrong,_ Walburga thinks, something like victory welling in her chest.

_This was my choice._

————

She sees him later, at the dinner to celebrate their engagement, and Orion kisses her hand is a chaste, proper way.

They linger, for a moment.

‘I thought you’d forgotten,’ she murmurs to him, as she reaches out and needlessly adjusts his collar.

‘No.’

A man of few words. _But that’s ok,_ she thinks, as she leans up and presses a kiss to the corner of his mouth, leaving a smudge of dark lipstick behind. _I can talk enough for the both of us._

And if they’re looking at me, they’re not watching him.

Orion lifts a hand, and tucks a stay hair behind her ear. His thumb lingers, for a moment on her cheekbone.

————

 _Yes_ , Walburga thinks as she watches him later, meeting his intense gaze.

_We do understand each other, don’t we?_

Orion’s mouth twitches, in a near approximation of a smirk.

 _Yes,_ he seems to say, _yes we do._

————

The wedding is - according to Irma - beautiful.

Walburga doesn’t care.

All she knows is Orion’s hand in hers, and the rush of control, of _victory_ she feels when the vicar introduces them as Mr. and Mrs. Black.

Orion’s face says that he understands.

————-

Later, much later, when they’re alone, finally, no more Irma, no more nosey family or pestering friends, Orion watches her.

Walburga unties her hair, until it’s loose around her shoulders and she turns to him again.

‘Ten years is a long time,’ she says, ‘so is four.’

Orion doesn’t smile. She doesn’t think she’s seen him smile in years. But his face does soften.

‘You were worth the wait,’ he whispers, and he pulls her close for a kiss.

————

END.

————


End file.
